Unisys Q3 2023 Earnings Call Transcript

Quartr
Provided by Quartr
August 31, 2023

There are 8 speakers on the call.

Operator

Good day and thank you for standing by. Welcome to the Greif Third Quarter 2023 Earnings Conference Call. At this time, all participants are in a listen only mode. After the speakers' presentation, there will be a question and answer Please be advised that today's conference is being recorded. And I would now like to hand the conference over to your speaker today, Mr.

Operator

Matt Leahy. Mr. Leahy, please go ahead.

Speaker 1

Thanks, and good morning, everyone. Welcome to Greif's 3rd quarter fiscal 2023 earnings conference call. This is Matt Leahy, Greif's Vice President of Corporate Development and Investor Relations, And I'm joined by Ole Rosgaard, Greif's President and Chief Executive Officer and Larry Hilsheimer, Greif's Chief Financial Officer. We will take questions at the end of today's call. In accordance with Regulation Fair Disclosure, please ask questions regarding issues you consider important because we are prohibited from discussing material non public information with you on an individual basis.

Speaker 1

Please turn to Slide 2. As a reminder, during today's call, we will make forward looking statements involving plans, expectations and beliefs related to future events. Actual results could differ materially from those discussed. Additionally, we will be referencing certain non GAAP financial measures And reconciliations to the most directly comparable GAAP metrics in the appendix of today's presentation. And now, I'll turn the presentation over to Ole on slide 3.

Speaker 2

Thanks, Matt, and good morning, everyone. Our global Drive team executed very well in our Fiscal Q3 had posted strong performance despite the continuation of historic volume headwinds. Our teams are leaning on our build to last strategy to drive results in this difficult environment. And I could not be prouder of the work we are doing to manage and improve the business and better serve customers. Our performance in the 1st 9 months of 2023 with strong EBITDA performance and margins and free cash flow conversion Well above our targeted 50% is a testament to the growing resilience of our business model and our commitment to both manage the present while building the future.

Speaker 2

Before further covering our results, I want to share an exciting update on 2 of our key missions in our Build to Less strategy. Creating thriving communities It's a mission devoted to cultivating a culture of appreciation, inclusion and recognition for all our internal colleagues and external stakeholders. In the Q3, we launched our Colleague Stock Purchase Plan, a program that enables colleagues from corporates down through production to acquire Greif Class A shares at a discount to market prices. We believe in the power of ownership to drive greater accountability and commitment to excellence across the organization and this program will provide the means for our colleagues to participate and the economic benefits of value creation. I'm proud to welcome our colleagues to the table as fellow owners of our company and look forward to expanding this program in the months and years to come.

Speaker 2

On our mission To deliver legendary customer service, each quarter represent latest results of our customer satisfaction index, a mechanism We used to formally receive regular feedback from customers on overall satisfaction with Greif in terms of product quality, Customer service and our ability to deliver value, our aspirational benchmark of success is a score of 95 out of 100. This quarter, our global consolidated score was 94.2, Just shy of that gold and an exceptional result given the challenges our customers are facing in the markets, Graif's steadfast commitments to our customers is evidence. We will provide you and support you and built on our existing relationships in good times and in bad. And you can count on us to deliver with quality and service excellence Every day, our dedication and relentless focus on customer service is core to who we are as an organization And our excellent CSI score during this challenging period is a reminder of the value we provide. Now, I'd like to shift focus back to financial results on Slide 4, where I'll turn it over to Larry to kick things off.

Speaker 3

Thanks, Louis, and good morning, everyone. Given Greif's overall financial performance relative to the operating environment we have been in this year, We want to briefly step back from our single quarter results and just take stock of where the company is now relative to our initial view Softness in many of our end markets and I discussed on our Q4 'twenty two earnings call how given our level of uncertainty, We had run a robust scenario analysis to arrive at the wide guidance range for 2023 of $820,000,000 to $906,000,000 in EBITDA and $410,000,000 to $460,000,000 in free cash flow. I'll be frank with everyone. While we considered at the time the possibility of an extended slow demand cycle, we did not weight that heavily as Doing so would imply we felt that we were headed into another industrial recession. Clearly, that initial assumption in December was wrong.

Speaker 3

And while we may not be in a broad economic recession, global manufacturing PMIs remain below 50 for the 11th month in a row And our year to date volumes across GIP and PPS are both tracking down mid to high teens year to date. If that's not indicative of an industrial recession, then I'm not sure what is. Another relevant comparison is the recessionary scenario slide we outlined at our Investor Day in June of last year, showing downside risk to $600,000,000 to $700,000,000 of EBITDA $260,000,000 to $320,000,000 in free cash flow. A few points comparing that scenario against our current environment. Number 1, recession steel drum volumes assumed 5% down versus actual Q3 of down over 10%.

Speaker 3

Recession shale index prices assumed down 20% versus the actual down of 15 through July. Recession mill volumes assume 5% down versus an actual down over 20 In Q3, recession containerboard prices assumed 10% versus the actual Q3 down about 8%. To summarize, current steel drum volumes are tracking down double the downside scenario, Mill volumes are down quadruple the downside scenario and overall pricing declines nearly match our downside scenario. And yet, our current guidance midpoint contemplates EBITDA and free cash flow that is over $100,000,000 above the level we provided for a recession scenario with only a partial lift from M and A. I illustrate these points to try to hammer home how well our teams are executing And I also want to share my heartfelt thanks to all of our Greif colleagues for their commitment and dedication this year.

Speaker 3

Ole, thanks for letting me take the time to boast about our team's performance, but it's really commendable how well we are doing and I'd like our investors Keep that in mind as they consider our detailed results. Thanks, Larry,

Speaker 2

and well said. As Larry just mentioned, we again reported Strong adjusted EBITDA of $226,500,000 only $2,000,000 shy of our previous quarter and less than $25,000,000 short of the very strong 2022 comparative period. Our free cash generation was also extraordinary, reported at $167,100,000 nearly equal to the very strong Q3 of 2022, but on volumes, which were more or less 15% lower. As mentioned in my opening remarks, that free cash flow figure represents a conversion rate of over 70%, which is well ahead of our long term target of more than 50%. Our disciplined approach to managing cost And working capital are driving this performance as we are truly playing with the entire piano spanning from operational and commercial excellence to supply chain and sourcing and automation efforts, all to drive improvements across our business.

Speaker 2

We also announced another step up in our annual reoccurring dividends, with our total quarterly dividend now at $0.52 $0.78 for Class A and B shares respectively. The strength Of our balance sheet and growing free cash flow generation has widened our available capital allocation opportunities, And we are excited to continue to deliver cash to our shareholders. Lastly, I'm excited to announce Another addition to the Gripen portfolio, as this past week, we signed an agreement to acquire 51% ownership In Copac, which I'd like to discuss more on the following slides. Slide 5, please. Copac is a truly special paper converting business as the number 2 supplier of bulk and specialty partitions in North America.

Speaker 2

For those unfamiliar, a petition is a divider included commonly in corrugated boxes As a method of separating fragile content such as glass bottles, cold pack manufacturers a wide range of partitions from both URB and Containerboard and predominantly serves the stable and growing food and beverage markets. There are 2 facilities in Urbana, Ohio and in Fairfield, California, a site which is strategically located to serve the high end wine bottling business in Napa Valley. This business is immediately margin accretive to the global Gripe portfolio and is expected to contribute EBITDA before synergies of $15,000,000 to $20,000,000 per year. While the business is small relative to our global portfolio, several organic and inorganic growth opportunities remain to quickly grow and further scale this niche business. On top of the favorable standalone financials, Colpac's converting network consumes approximately 25,000 tons of paper per year, adding incremental downstream integration into our PPS network.

Speaker 2

Last but certainly not least, Colpac's management team is an excellent cultural fit to drive. We have known and done business with the Kohl family for years and share a set of values on how to take care of colleagues and serve customers. We are excited to partner with Copac in this new venture and grow the business together. I'll conclude by saying that even after the pro form a impact of this acquisition, our balance sheet remains in great shape And we sit below the midpoint of our target's leverage ratio range. Our M and A pipeline remains robust, And we intend to continue deploying capital towards more value accretive targets in the future.

Speaker 2

Now I'd like to shift gears and take a deeper dive into our segment results. So please turn to Slide 6. Our GIP business produced an excellent result with flat year over year gross profit despite Volume headwinds of nearly 20% in the Americas and nearly 10% in EMEA and APAC. Once again, the strict adherence to our value over volume philosophy in the markets, The benefits of our cost out actions taken earlier this year and lower year over year input costs led to an adjusted EBITDA lift of nearly $10,000,000 year over year despite substantially lower revenues. On the volume side, all GIP products and geographies showed softness compared to the prior year, with global steel and resin based products both down mid double digits on a per day basis.

Speaker 2

Sequentially, Our Q3 closely mirrored our Q2 with demand flat in EMEA and APAC and slightly down in LatAm and North America. Through August, we do not have a line of sight into any notable upward demand inflections in our GIP business And we'll continue to manage this business as we have through the year with a focus on cost and customer service. I commend our global GIP team for their exemplary performance in the Q3 and throughout 2023. Please turn to Slide 7. Paper Packaging's 3rd quarter sales declined $146,000,000 year over year, primarily due to demand weakness across our converting businesses and mills.

Speaker 2

We took approximately 55,000 tons of economic downtime across our mill system in the 3rd quarter as we faced nearly 10% per day volume declines across our primary converting operations. The continued low volume environments combined with rising OCC costs during the quarter led to both EBITDA dollar and EBITDA margin compression compared to prior year. That said, our PPS team utilized the same playbook as GIP in reference to value over volume and cost elimination, resulting in a still healthy 7.4 percent EBITDA margin for the quarter. Our PPS team is managing the business Very well against multiple headwinds and I'm proud of their results and continued dedication during these challenging times. I will now turn the presentation over to Larry on Slide 8.

Speaker 3

Thank you, Oli. As Oli and I mentioned in earlier prepared remarks, deliver these results and my heartfelt thanks goes out to each department within Greif for delivering for our customers and our shareholders this year. Back to the Q3 financials. Sales decreased approximately $290,000,000 year over year, primarily due to lower volumes and the impact of significantly lower steel costs. Despite this, adjusted EBITDA declined less than $25,000,000 leading to over 150 basis points of margin expansion.

Speaker 3

Most impressive, however, was our free cash flow performance. Cash flow dollars were down only $8,000,000 year over year on substantially higher free cash flow conversion. Just to remind everyone, Q3 of last year was the highest 3rd quarter cash flow in the history of our company and we missed it this quarter by only $8,000,000 With $290,000,000 lower sales, volumes down nearly 15% year over year, higher CapEx and $11,000,000 of higher interest costs related to higher rates in our recent M and A activity. That's truly outstanding. To put it another way, on a trailing 12 month basis, our adjusted free cash flow is tracking at $580,000,000 more than double the average annual free cash generated between our 2019 2021 fiscal years.

Speaker 3

On any measure, the cash output of this company is miles ahead of where it once was, And we still do not believe that that fact is fully recognized by the market. We have raised the bar on performance and the elevated cash flow dynamic has opened up And now I'd like to touch on Our other capital allocation priorities on Slide 9 before discussing guidance. Mohit discussed the recent acquisition of Colfax in his remarks. We're pleased to be taking another step on our Investor Day commitment to grow downstream integration in our paper system, at the same time we're pursuing our resin based We have spent over $550,000,000 on M and A over the last 9 months, but our work is not done and our Pipeline remains robust. We expect to continue generating sufficient cash to fund various actionable opportunities and still maintain a strong balance sheet.

Speaker 3

In addition to pursuing inorganic growth, I'm excited to announce we are Again raising our dividend, fulfilling a commitment we made to investors over a year ago. While our dividend yield may no longer be industry leading, thanks to some long overdue appreciation in our stock price, it is still one of the most compelling dividend offerings in our industry. By raising our dividend For the coming year by 4%, we are reaffirming our commitment to deliver cash directly back to our shareholders. As our business grows, we expect to grow our dividend at program. And while we are not executing on any current buyback programs, we retain an open authorization for 2,600,000 shares and may further repurchases opportunistically in the coming year.

Speaker 3

With that, I'd like to close by discussing our revised guidance on Slide 10. As you can see, the midpoint of our guidance for EBITDA and free cash flow remains unchanged. Given the closer line of sight to Full year results, we are tightening the range by $10,000,000 on each side and now expect full year EBITDA to land between $790,000,000 $820,000,000 and full year free cash flow between $400,000,000 $430,000,000 Our overall Q3 financial results largely met our expectations. However, the individual drivers differ. Volumes were below plan in nearly all substrates, but margins were better for the reasons previously mentioned.

Speaker 3

As with prior quarters, our current forward guidance assumes no improvement on volumes through the end of the year. Additionally, We will plan to share our views on fiscal 2024 in our Q4 call in early December. We expect to finish the year with another quarter of strong performance Despite the persistent macroeconomic challenges we face, I'd like to remind everyone that the midpoint of our guidance range implies the best 2nd best financial performance in Greif's 145 year history surpassed only by our record year in 2022. We are confident that we have set a new bar for performance and expect that we will continue to deliver these exceptional results as we make future progress on our build to last journey. Ole, I'll hand it back to you to close on Slide 11.

Speaker 2

Thanks, Larry. As Larry just mentioned, our guidance reflects the expectation of the 2nd best year in Grieg's 145 year history. And we are extremely proud to be in that position considering the headwinds we have and are facing. Great companies often prove their worth in times of great difficulty through perseverance, grits and dedication to excellence. Built on last is how we demonstrate that perseverance and I see it daily in the passion of our colleagues and decision making at every level of our business.

Speaker 2

We are well positioned for demand rebound whenever that comes. And in the meantime, we are excited to continue building this business and making progress on our long term strategy. We thank you for your interest in Greif. Operator, please open the line to questions.

Operator

Thank you. One moment please for our first question. And our first question will come from Michael E. Hoffman of Stifel. Your line is open.

Speaker 4

Thank you, Oleg and Larry for taking the questions. I look forward to seeing you next week in Paris and London. When we finished 2Q, I have in my notes, if I'm wrong, I accept that I'm wrong. I have in my notes the cadence in the second half It was going to sort of EBITDA was going to track around a couple of 100,000,000 in the 3Q and then improve modestly into 4Q Hit the midpoint. You beat the outlook for 3Q given your again repeated exceptional performance around cost.

Speaker 4

That has the 4th quarter down pretty healthy. How am I what is my interpretation of The implied EBITDA being 185 versus something that was like low 200s to 210 originally.

Speaker 3

Yes, Michael, you're correct. I mean, the Q3 ended up being better on the margin side. Volume degradation though was more than we expected and we don't see that mark that volume Picking up and we've seen ag perform less favorable than we normally do. So with That trend, it just shifted things a bit. We also had anticipated that we would have some a tax refund item that In Latin America, it's like $6,000,000 We had anticipated that might occur later.

Speaker 3

It came into the 3rd quarter. It's actually a non cash item as well, which really impacted cash flow a little bit. But it's really those two items. Obviously, we hope volumes will pick up and Surprised us a bit in the Q4, but we have not seen that in August yet.

Speaker 4

Okay. And then to that point, we've talked before about sort of major end markets in GIP, Sort of chemical paints and coatings and lubricants. So are we hearing a message that it's not worse, It's just not any better or is some of those got worse?

Speaker 3

Hi, Michael.

Speaker 2

Our customers are telling us that it's not getting worse, but they're also telling us that they don't expect Any improvements over the next two quarters. So from what we hear, we will be in the Q2 of 2024 before There's even any remote chance of improvements. That's what we hear from our customers.

Speaker 4

Okay. And then on TPS, I cover things that recycle all this OCC and that end of my coverage says that they're starting to see improving demand. So is there a light at the end of the tunnel and all of this the finished goods inventory clearing and demand starts to improve?

Speaker 3

Yes, Mike, we're I think part of what's creating a little bit of demand on the waste companies for the OCC side of things is really just related to Some new mill capacity opening in recycled mills. Outside of that, we're not we saw a couple Times over the last month or so where we saw a spike in orders for a week, but then the next week they fell back off. So We haven't seen anything sustained that would indicate any lift and we're not hearing anything from our customers in the paper business That gives them any real solid indications of an inflection point.

Speaker 4

But it sounds like you feel like you have hit a bottom. If you're getting momentary spikes, you probably hit a bottom.

Speaker 3

Yes, we hope so. I mean, and we think that, but Yes. We thought the second half of this fiscal year would be good and I missed that call. So, I'm not really good with my crystal ball.

Speaker 4

Yes, you and I both. And then last one for me is why not own 100% of coal?

Speaker 3

This is a deal that because of our long relationship with them Yes. They approached us to help because of growth opportunities, but maybe I'll let Matt talk a little bit about that because Matt leads our business development efforts and I dealt with the Kohl family on

Speaker 1

this. Yes. So Michael, the reason to not own 100% is that We and the Kohl's believe that there's substantial growth opportunity ahead and we want to have aligned incentives as we try to grow that business together. Part of the partnership, the reason it makes sense is because they see real opportunities in the market to grow substantially, but they need to make sure they have the mill capacity to do it. So that's the strategic rationale.

Speaker 1

We're excited about adding into the portfolio from a margin perspective, from an end market perspective, But also think that that 51% ownership stake and partnership going forward makes sense for both of us to Maximize the growth and value creation of that business over time.

Speaker 3

Yes. And they're highly respected in the industry because of Sort of their word is their bond kind of thing. They're good people. They're Ohio people. And they want to participate in the growth.

Speaker 4

Okay. Thank you very much.

Operator

Thank you. And one moment please for our next question. Our next question will come from the line of Ghansham Panjabi of Baird. Your line is open.

Speaker 3

Hey, guys. Good morning.

Speaker 5

I know it's very difficult to disaggregate, but on the volume decline in GIP, How would you separate end market weakness versus any incremental destocking at the customer level? And I'm just asking that because As raw material prices started to decline for some of your customers, they did start to accelerate destocking and just kind of wondering where we are in that phase.

Speaker 2

Hi, guys. I'm sorry. We don't think that destocking has come to an end, but it's difficult just to See whether it's really come to an end, but we believe what we see now is really just a manifestation of Extremely low demand in the markets, if that's helpful. Got it.

Speaker 5

And then in terms of the margin improvement in GIP, which has been Very notable in context of the volume declines you've cited. How should we think about incrementals as volumes eventually recover? And I was asking because are there any big cost reversal Headwinds we should keep in mind in that scenario?

Speaker 2

Well, obviously, on that side, we've taken a lot of cost outs. Some of it is structural. We've done Rooftop consolidations, we also are able to in that business to flex really, really rapidly as demand goes down. So if demand returns, we obviously have room to we can increase our capacity, Let's say 2% to 5% without any cost increases, but if demand goes up Further than that, you would have to add shifts. So you will see variable cost goes up in line with increased demands.

Speaker 2

But a lot of the cost we've taken out is structural. Got it. And then

Speaker 5

just one final one on Colpac. If you broke out the sales number, I missed that. So if could please repeat that. And then also as it relates to fiscal year 2024, I mean, obviously, very early, big range of outcomes just based on the macro complexity, etcetera. But can you give us some of the known variances that we should keep in mind as we finalize our modeling estimates for fiscal year 2024?

Speaker 5

You have Colpak, obviously the EBITDA contribution From there, any flow through from cost savings, price declines in paper, anything you could share there?

Speaker 1

Yes Ghansham, this is Matt. On Colpac, we didn't give a revenue number, but EBITDA run rate EBITDA is about $17,000,000 $18,000,000 and then that does not include kind of the incremental benefits that go to the mills from us absorbing more tons. And you can think about that on a full year run rate basis. We're not going to give revenue right now around margins, but that should be instructive as you build a model for next year. On the other components, you can add a portion of the contribution from Lee, A couple of months a portion from Centurion and then obviously this, what you think about next year from an M and A basis.

Speaker 1

And then in terms of the other cost elements, I don't know, you were asking for thinking about next year. I don't know if we really have that.

Speaker 3

Yes. I would just say on the M and A side, Ghansham, between Lease and Juri In Colfax, you probably have $40,000,000 of incremental revenue this year. We take out 2 maybe on the TEMA things that we're up Net 38. And if you look at the numbers we provided on each of those, you had 33 for Lee, 20 for Centurion and 17 on Colfax on a full year So you'd have a lift of maybe 28 next year, 30 kind of number. And then on the cost takeouts, We haven't quantified the rooftop consolidation piece.

Speaker 3

There's obviously some permanent cost take out there. On structural overtime, we've taken out a significant number this year, call it roughly $30,000,000 of overtime. Some of that's shift in volume related, but we think there's somewhere $10,000,000 to $13,000,000 of Permanent structural change in how we're running the business.

Speaker 2

Okay, super helpful. Thank you.

Operator

Thank you. Again, one moment please for our next question. Our next question will come from George Staphos of Bank of America. Your line is open.

Speaker 6

Thanks very much. Hi, Oli. Hi, Larry. Matt. Good morning.

Speaker 6

Yes. Hi, George. Congratulations on the performance. Thanks. I wanted to A lot of the questions have already sort of gotten at the heart of matter for you and again what was really, really good performance in light of things.

Speaker 6

When you're talking to your customers, Oli, what are they saying about why they believe demand isn't lifting yet? Again, I know that's really, really hard to quantify. You cover so many markets and so many customers, but is there a common denominator, 1 or 2 things that they're seeing in terms of why we're not seeing demand lift downstream?

Speaker 2

Yes. So first of all, when I speak to a lot of them, our big global customers, They've taken plants down. They've taken a lot of economic downtime. It's really back to what we have discussed previously that the economy has shifted from buying things to going out and consumer spending They have money on services instead. I saw recently a couple of articles from the big box retailers in terms of How they're suffering, that's the closest I can get.

Speaker 2

And then in terms of Just the interest rates, people are not moving houses as they have been, means that they don't buy goods when they move houses, they don't Necessarily paints and that sort of thing. So but to put my finger on one particular item is really, really difficult.

Speaker 6

Understood. And on the ag side, you said ag is maybe trending a little bit less positive than you normally would like to see

Speaker 2

in the coming years.

Speaker 6

Anything to take away from that?

Speaker 2

Yes. What I've been told also on ag is that in times of hardship, what the individual farmers tend To do is to use less fertilizer and less Roundup and that sort of thing. It's just a part of Managing their business.

Speaker 6

Understood. Can you talk about What price cost benefit you might have gotten from steel in the fiscal 3rd and what you might be expecting in the fiscal 4th? And then back to Ghansham's earlier question. So should we take away that as things ultimately hopefully pick up, There's maybe $20,000,000 of costs that will come back into the business on an annualized basis?

Speaker 3

George, yes, there was a slight The better situation we had on a year over year basis on steel because last year we had a rapidly Decreasing steel cost curve, so we had higher inventory walking through, but it was not material for the quarter. As to that $20,000,000 the differential on that overtime number I mentioned, yes, it will come back, but that only comes back with Sales and that would be leveraging our fixed cost footprint because we aren't building new factories to get that. So it will be adding labor back, but it won't be adding anything on depreciation and other costs that go in. So Still nice margin lift. Yes, George.

Speaker 6

I get that just in terms of when we do our stack, We need to make sure that we have kind of a small negative slice for the 2020 is what I'm getting at after volume, after incremental margin and so on.

Speaker 1

George, just important to mention those costs don't come back at the same rate sales do.

Operator

Okay.

Speaker 1

So it's not a one to one relationship. Demand improves, sales dollars improve, costs come right back in. They come back a lot more slowly. And there's a lot of kind of flat capacity just that we have in our system right now on existing ships. So we can handle more demand and an inflection Without layering in incremental costs right away, but over time as sales come back that's a good problem to solve that

Speaker 3

Yes, that's what Dolly was mentioning. If you go up 2% to 3%, we don't have to add a dime. You go up 20%, yes, you have to add a shift or something.

Speaker 2

And Josh, just a final comment on that. No. Yes, just a final comment on that. Just go back to our strategy of value over volume. We will not take on business.

Speaker 2

So we are running at, I won't say full capacity, but healthy capacity utilization in all our facilities. We will not take on business with low margins and then add cost in our plants in terms of another shift to produce Products that we make low margins on. That's not our strategy.

Speaker 6

No, makes sense, Oli. My last question and I'll turn it over. Same theme in terms of okay, let's get on the other side of the mountain and volumes are better and so onward, hopefully, a better 24. Free cash flow conversion has been excellent this year, well above your goal in the last quarter. Is there a chance that maybe realizing you're not going to guide on 24 that the conversion in 24 maybe is a little below 50% because you do have to add back to Capital, you do have to do some other things or no.

Speaker 6

And then tell me a little bit about the program that you're offering your Employees to buy stock at a discount, what did you compare that with in terms of other ways to incentivize performance and ownership? Thanks guys. Yes.

Speaker 3

So, two things on that. I mean, it's all going to depend on the pace of the increase of demand, George, And also then where does the cost of steel end up is the big driver for us in terms of what will be the impact on working capital build. OCC will play into that as well. Obviously, if demand comes back, you would think that's going to drive steel cost up in OCC. But We would still have our goal to be 50% or better and we have other opportunities within our supply chain Initiatives that we believe can keep us at that our goal level.

Speaker 3

So That'll be our focus. I mean, obviously, the outsized performance that we had this quarter is substantially above our goal. We would love that, but we don't see that. But just for another example, Colpak is well above our 50% on Free cash flow conversion and we're trying to focus on those type of businesses as we execute on our M and A strategy in both the resin business and also in the downstream in our paper business. With respect to The stock purchase plan for our colleagues, this actually emanated from requests from our employees.

Speaker 3

We had a number of requests As we went around to plants around the world, from probably colleagues who had worked at other places that had this and they said, hey, look, we really like what's going on in the company, Could we entertain something like this? And so we presented to the Board, they approved it. And we had Good take up in the 1st initial quarter of application and have had really nice feedback from colleagues, so we look forward to it growing from here.

Speaker 6

Was there any sort of discussion about like what kind of discount are you giving your employees to buy the stock, right? Others would like a discount too in the market, but Yes,

Speaker 3

it's a 15% discount, which is pretty standard in these programs. Okay.

Speaker 6

All right, guys. I appreciate it. Thanks so much. Thanks, George. Thank

Operator

Our next question will come from Gabe Hajde of Wells Fargo. Your line is open.

Speaker 7

Larry, Matt. Good morning.

Speaker 3

Hey, David.

Speaker 7

I'm curious and again, a lot of ground has been covered And it's challenging to answer a question like this, but from a competitive landscape standpoint, more specifically thinking about The more mature markets in North America and Europe. Do you believe that we've seen sort of higher costs of capital manifest in different pricing behavior or competitive activity in the markets in which you participate? Or is that something that we still think is on the come, would be my first question.

Speaker 3

Yes, I don't know that we would necessarily attribute competitive behavior to their cost of capital, Obviously, in our GIP business, one of our primary competitors is very highly levered. So it does put pressure on them, but I think it puts pressure in the right direction. So that's a good thing. I mean the more the place where we're seeing that really play out more is In our strategic M and A activities, I mean, it's clearly put the PE model in a much different Position than they were 2 or 3 years ago and puts us in a very, very good position relative to what we're trying to do in the market. So, no, that's not exactly responsive to what your question was, Gabe, but We see the favorability there.

Speaker 3

We're not seeing anything in the competitor marketplace that I would attribute to their Cost of capital at least that we could discern.

Speaker 7

Sure. Well, no, I guess maybe ask the question a little bit better. In a down demand environment would be just intuitively how you would think about competitors coming out and maybe being a little bit more aggressive To pick up business and keep share, are you seeing that or again, it kind of seems like based on your results, the answer is no and in fact you're able To price for value.

Speaker 2

Gabe, I can give you a crystal clear yes to that.

Speaker 3

Yes. Okay.

Speaker 4

All right.

Speaker 7

And then, I guess just one last one, appreciating that there's some math behind it, but you made a pretty strong statement that So it sounds like you're going to be out doing some M and A. The pipeline is pretty full. Is there a point at which Share repurchase becomes more compelling than maybe deploying capital on the M and A side or is it not a binary decision like that from a, I guess mathematical return standpoint?

Speaker 3

Yes, I don't think it's binary. I guess if we found that we could not Deploy capital in attractive M and A along our strategic objectives, then it would become more compelling to start buying Cheers, Beth. We continue to believe our shares are phenomenally undervalued. I think our multiples are stupid low.

Speaker 2

But that said, the M

Speaker 3

and A deals we are doing, the returns that we've got forecast are quite compelling. And to the That we continue to have those type of opportunities, we will go down that path. I mean, I don't remember if Matt talked about this. I mean, Yes, the Colpak deals at 8 times and then after synergies that we'll get from integration price 6. So if we can do deals like that that are high margin, high cash flow conversion, at those kind of multiples, We'll be doing that for a long time before we do a lot of capital on stock repurchase.

Speaker 3

But if we can't, Then we'll go the other way and these are not mutually exclusive. Like I said, we will be doing some stock repurchase stuff Opportunistically, over the next year as well. Okay.

Speaker 7

Last one for me. I know George was pushing that working capital a little bit. CapEx has been elevated over the past 2 years. I think I read some articles over the past week or so that you guys made some investments at the River Mill And Virginia, at least from a planning budgeting standpoint, on the CapEx side, Larry, is that Can you give us a ballpark of that maybe it's in that 160 range or something like that where you expect it to be down from where we are this year? Or are you seeing Enough opportunities in the pipeline organically where you might have $180,000,000 to $200,000,000 of CapEx next year?

Speaker 3

I think the levels we've been running last couple of years are something I would continue to model in. I think we've got opportunities Including our whole effort around digitization. I mean, we believe that there's going to be substantive returns from us Digitizing more and becoming much more customer friendly. So we've got The opportunity to deploy capital in areas that we believe will return well for us. So I think that level is good for your modeling purposes.

Speaker 7

Great. Thank you.

Operator

Thank And our next question is a follow-up from Michael E. Hoffman of Stifel. Your line is open.

Speaker 4

Thank you. I just want to make sure I understood the one answer. The unequivocal yes is the yes the customers are being or the competitors are being disciplined or yes they're being They're acting badly.

Speaker 3

I don't know whether you call it acting badly, but are they I think the question is, Are they being super competitive? And the answer is yes.

Speaker 4

So not irrational. Otherwise

Speaker 3

We've always got somebody acting irrational somewhere in the world, Michael. I mean, but it's when you've got as many plants as we do and as the number of customers, There's always going to be something where some lone wolf out there is totally irrational. But as a broad answer Across the customer base, no, they're not being irrational. They're doing it at prices in some cases that we're not going to do because we're not going to chase The volume, like we've said, our focus is on value and delivering best customer service in the world and being responsive And really treating our customers well and getting paid for the value.

Speaker 2

And I said earlier, we don't need to chase volume.

Speaker 4

Right. Yes. No, I applaud the action. I've seen it across other industries and when you do that, you get the kind of results you're producing. But the other read through to this is the moment volume starts to improve, they back right off of that.

Speaker 4

So there's a snap around price as potential.

Speaker 3

We would love to see that.

Speaker 4

Okay, great. Thank you.

Operator

Thank you. And I'm seeing no further questions in the queue. I would now like to turn the conference back to Matt Leahy for closing remarks.

Speaker 1

Thank you everyone for joining today. I hope you have a wonderful day.

Operator

This concludes today's conference call. Thank you all for participating. You may now disconnect and have a pleasant day.

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Earnings Conference Call
Unisys Q3 2023
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